


Can't Handle You

by OverlyCheerfulRat



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies)
Genre: AU, Ableism, Autism, Disabled Character, F/M, Mental Institutions, Muteness, Period Typical Attitudes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-13
Updated: 2019-03-16
Packaged: 2019-11-17 13:19:58
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 4,414
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18099296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/OverlyCheerfulRat/pseuds/OverlyCheerfulRat
Summary: Theseus takes his autistic brother, Newt, to America with the intention of institutionalizing him. It does not go as planned.





	1. Chapter 1

His little brother was strange. Theseus wouldn’t admit it, but he thought Newt was kind of annoying. He was four years old, but he didn’t talk and he had to wear diapers. Their mother said it was lucky he was small for his age. Once, Theseus had pinched him to try and make him say something, but he just cried. Newt cried a lot. Their mother said he was just a late bloomer, but Theseus knew she worried that it was more than that.

Theseus wasn’t sure if his little brother would even get a Hogwarts letter, but as Newt’s eleventh birthday approached, an owl delivered an acceptance letter bearing the school crest. Their mother threw it away without reading it. That night, Theseus lay awake in the room he shared with his brother, listening to Newt breathe, and wondered what they were supposed to do with him. He was getting older, but he still needed constant care and attention. Their mother wouldn’t be able to watch him forever.

Years later, their mother died suddenly in a carriage accident, and Theseus was left in charge of Newt. He had no intention of keeping his brother with him (why their mother had tolerated him for so long was beyond Theseus) and immediately booked two tickets to America. He’d heard the asylums there were kinder to patients, and he didn’t want his baby brother to suffer- he wasn’t a monster, just a busy man with no time to play nanny.


	2. Chapter 2

His mum was dead. Newt knew that, and he knew it was his fault. She wouldn’t have been frustrated if he hadn’t started crying, and if she hadn’t been frustrated she would have looked where she was going, and if she had looked where she was going she wouldn’t have been hit by the carriage. So it was his fault, but Theseus didn’t know. The only living person who knew was Newt, and Newt couldn’t tell anyone anything. He had been able to sort of communicate with his mum- she taught him to pull her on her left sleeve if he had an accident, and if he needed something like food or water or a blanket to pull on her right sleeve and point at what he needed. 

Newt didn’t think Theseus liked him very much. Once, when Newt was eighteen, he had walked downstairs in the middle of the night to get a drink of water, and heard his mum arguing with Theseus in the parlor. She was whispering, but Theseus wasn’t bothering to keep his voice down. 

“For the last time, I will never send my son away!”

“Mother, please, you can’t take care of him forever. Newt’s an adult now, and you know he needs more help than you can provide here. There are places-”

“I’ve heard all about those places! They tie patients up and leave them to rot. What kind of monster would send their family to an asylum?”

“It’s not like that anymore, there’ve been changes. Why can’t you understand that he’d be happier there?”

“You think he’d be happier with muggle doctors torturing him?”

“Electroconvulsive therapy isn’t torture, it’s been proven to-”

Newt hadn’t heard the rest of what they said, as he’d run back upstairs to hide in his closet. His mum had filled it with blankets and pillows and plastered the walls with moving pictures of magical beasts. It was his favorite place in the world.

Now he’d never get to curl up there again. Theseus was taking him to America and he wasn’t coming back. Newt wasn’t stupid, he understood what it meant when Theseus cleared his room out. He’d started to sob when his closet hiding space was dismantled, Theseus carelessly packing up the blankets and pillows, ripping down the pictures. Newt spent the rest of the day hugging the nice blue coat his mum had made for him last year and rocking himself to calm down.


	3. Chapter 3

There was nowhere to hide in New York, as Newt discovered when he panicked and ran away from Theseus. He hadn’t meant to, he had just been so scared of all the noise, but there was nowhere to get away from it. Eventually he ended up on the floor of a phone booth with his knees pulled to his chest, trembling violently. This was even worse, now he was alone in this huge city, his mum was dead, his brother was going to get rid of him, and all the pictures of his creatures were gone. At least he still had his coat.

Newt had never been good at judging the passage of time, so when someone touched his head he wasn’t sure how long he’d been in the phone booth. He looked up through his fringe at a grey-coated woman with a bob haircut, who was frowning at him.

“Are you drunk?” Drunk… no, he wasn't. He’d never had alcohol. Newt shook his head, slipping his thumb into his mouth nervously. A sudden look of understanding crossed the woman’s face, and her disapproving scowl was replaced with a gentle half-smile. “I see. Are you with someone?” Her tone was softer and slower now. Newt hesitated. Did he even want to go back to Theseus? He didn’t know why his brother had brought him to America, but he knew he wouldn’t be going back to England. 

While he considered his answer, the woman helped him to his feet, apparently taking his silence for a no. “Can you tell me how you got here?” A boat, Newt though, but he didn’t know how to convey that- wait, he could just show her his passport. He fumbled in his coat pocket for a moment and then handed her the document before putting his hands over his ears. She glanced at it. “Newton?” He nodded. “Nice to meet you. I’m Tina Goldstein.”

Tina seemed to realize how uncomfortable he was, so she gently put her hand on his elbow and hurriedly led him into the closest building. “Now, I’m gonna take you back to my apartment in a little while, but first you need to calm down in here.” Newt nodded again, wrapping his coat tighter around himself and sucking his thumb. Tina smiled and patted his head, then quickly moved her hand when he flinched at the touch. “Sorry!”

After a long, comfortable silence, Tina turned to Newt with a smile. “Are you ready to go to my apartment?” He nodded and got to his feet, mentally preparing himself to go outside again. “I don’t live far,” Tina assured him. She wasn’t lying, it turned out- only a few minutes later they were in her building.


	4. Chapter 4

Tina sat Newt in a chair by the door when they entered her apartment. “Just wait here, okay? I’m gonna ask my sister if she has any ideas to help you.” Newt nodded and sat down to wait, wincing when the sodden material of his nappy pressed against him. Theseus had always put off changing him as long as he could, apparently not caring that it gave him a rash, and now it really hurt. Newt hadn’t noticed earlier, too caught up in other things, but now he had little else to focus on. He couldn’t ask Tina for help because he barely knew her, and it would be improper to ask a woman something like that anyway.

While Newt worried over his situation, Tina found Queenie making soup in the kitchen. “I found a man on the streets,” she began. “Is he good-looking?” Tina rolled her eyes. “No- I mean, yes, but that’s not important. He’s feeble minded, I found him crying in a phone booth. Look, he gave me his passport,” she added, handing it to Queenie. “He’s from England. Can you find out anything else?” Queenie nodded, frowning slightly. “I have trouble with accents,” she muttered.

Both sisters walked back into the entry room, and Tina gave Newt a sweet smile. “This is my sister, Queenie,” she introduced. Newt waved awkwardly, not meeting her eyes. Queenie sat next to him, and for several minutes they were all quiet. Finally, she stood up and waved Tina into the kitchen. “Well, the good news is that he’s not feeble-minded at all. Actually, he seems really smart. Something’s different in his mind… I don’t know what it is, exactly.” Tina frowned. “But he’s clearly simple,” she protested softly.

“No. It’s like… like if I had a broken leg, I’d need help, but I’d still be me. Sort of like that.” Tina nodded slowly. “Go on.” “His brother brought him here, but he doesn’t know why. I got fear, though- he’s worried about what his brother’s gonna do. There was guilt, something related to his mother, and anxiety about being in a new place. The most important thing is that he’s from a wizard family. Or at least, his brother’s a wizard who works for the Ministry of Magic in England.” “Did you catch his name?” “Started with a T.”

Tina thought this over. “I don’t have access to foreign records, but I’ll see what I can do. Is there anything else?” Queenie giggled nervously and blushed. “Well- he was nervous about… uh, I guess he’s not… I mean, he’s still in diapers, and…” Tina went red. “Oh,” she mumbled. “I suppose we could use a cleaning spell…” Queenie nodded. “You’ve known him longer, so have fun with that.” Tina grit her teeth and walked back into the parlor.

“Newton?” Newt looked up at her, thumb still in his mouth, eyes wide. She smiled. “Hey. So, um, my sister noticed that you, you know, you had an accident,” she muttered. Below the freckles, his face went red and he ducked his head, starting to hum to himself. Tina stepped forward and took his elbow, helping him up. “Let me fix you up, okay? You must be uncomfortable.” Newt followed her into the bathroom, humming louder, but didn’t resist as she undressed him. “Scourgify,” Tina mumbled, trying not to look too closely at him. Newt had started to cry from embarrassment, and Tina was in such a hurry to get his pants back on that she stumbled several times.


	5. Chapter 5

When Theseus couldn’t find his brother after a week, he got permission from the Ministry to stay in America for the year. Still, it was almost five months before he saw Newt, and it was not under the circumstances he’d expected. He got lost in the MACUSA building and ended up in the Wand Permit Office, looking around in confusion. The building wasn’t set up very well, was it? Why, in England- before he could finish his grumpy internal monologue, he noticed Newt sitting next to a woman he didn’t recognize at a desk toward the back.

“Newt!” Both people looked up, and a frightened expression crossed Newt’s face for a moment. Theseus ran over, beaming. “Oh my god, I was so worried, where- where did you find him?” This was directed to the woman, who was smiling stiffly. “You must be his brother, then. I found Newt in a phone booth about five months ago,” she replied. Theseus nodded. “Well, thank you so much for taking care of him, I know it’s exhausting, in fact I brought him here to have him institutionalized,” he rambled. Newt flinched at that, but Theseus didn’t register it.

“He’s no trouble at all. I really enjoy his company, actually,” Tina said, her voice cold. Theseus gave a confused half-smile. “You don’t have to lie, ma’am, he doesn’t understand what we’re saying.” “Yes, he does. My sister is a Legilimens- that’s how we found out about you. Your brother’s actually quite intelligent.” Theseus looked from the woman to Newt, who was rocking back and forth and sucking his thumb. “Er… right. Anyway, we’ll be going now.” 

Tina looked at Newt, her annoyed expression changing into one of adoration. “Newt, do you want to leave?” He shook his head immediately. Theseus gaped at the exchange. Newt had never responded to him so quickly, and they were brothers. Before he could get too confused, Tina turned back to him. “If you like, you can come back to our apartment. My sister’ll be glad to meet you.”

And that was how Theseus ended up sleeping on the Goldstein sisters’ couch. The walls were thin enough that he could hear Queenie snoring, and he ended up staying awake longer than usual, trying to absorb the information she’d given him. All Newt’s life, he’d thought his brother was mentally retarded, but now this strange American witch said he was as smart as anyone, just… different. It was certainly a lot to wrap his mind around.

Theseus was thinking it over when his concentration was broken by Newt crying out in another room. He got to his feet at once and hurried toward the noise, pausing outside the door to listen for a moment. His face heated up at the stifled moans coming from within. Surely it wasn’t what it sounded like- even if Newt wasn’t simple, as Queenie claimed, it was hard to imagine… Theseus threw the door open and was greeted by a sight he had never expected to see. Tina and Newt were pressed together, naked, and Theseus had clearly interrupted something.


	6. Chapter 6

Newt yelped when his brother stormed in, hiding his face in Tina’s shoulder. Unfortunately, she opted to disentangle their limbs and turn to face Theseus, covering herself with a sheet while Newt curled into a ball next to her. “Hi,” she said after a long pause. Theseus swallowed. “What- what are you doing?” “We- well- I mean- sex,” Tina said awkwardly. Theseus gave no reply. “I, um, I assure you, we both- we both consented,” she added quickly. 

While they stared at each other, Newt thought about how his relationship with Tina had started. It had been two months after he came to stay with them, and he was helping Tina at her job. She’d been teaching him to read and write, and he knew enough now to sort documents while she typed up reports. They were sitting in companionable silence, and he’d glanced over at her only to be struck, not for the first time, by how beautiful she was. Newt took a scrap of parchment and a quill, then took a few moments to painstakingly write out, “you are very pretty”.

Tina glanced at the paper and smiled. “You’re quite handsome, too,” she said playfully, making Newt blush. As they walked home, he noticed a couple pass by. The man bent to kiss the woman’s forehead, and Newt wondered if he should kiss Tina like that. He liked her a lot, and sometimes he wanted to maybe be her boyfriend, and he thought she liked him too. She touched his face a lot, even when there was no real reason. Normally he didn’t like people touching him, but Tina was different.

Newt watched the couple walk away, then quickly bent down and pressed his lips to Tina’s forehead. She stopped walking, so he did too, hoping he hadn’t done anything wrong. “Newt,” she said slowly. “What was that about?” Newt shrugged. If he had paper he would have written that he liked her, a lot, but hopefully the shrug would convey that. Tina stared up at him, then smiled and took his hand.

Everything progressed slowly, but both of them were happy with that. Eventually, Newt ended up sharing Tina’s bed, and after that it wasn’t too long before they started having… intimate… relations. Their first time together was awkward, but ultimately enjoyable. Tina had rolled on top of him and kissed him passionately, then pulled back and asked, “You know what sex is, right?” Newt nodded. His mum had explained it after he walked in on her with a man from off the street.

The sex was slow and gentle, and it was weeks before they repeated it. The third time, Newt was the one who suggested it by kissing Tina’s neck and pulling on her nightgown. “You want to…?” He nodded, clumsily trying to remove his pajamas. Buttons were not his forte. Now, with Theseus standing across the room, Newt hugged his knees closer to his chest, terrified of what his brother would do. Surely he wouldn’t separate them. Newt was thirty years old, he was capable of making his own decisions by now.


	7. Chapter 7

Despite Tina’s protests that Newt had consented, he’d understood and wanted and enjoyed it, Theseus pointed his wand at her the minute he got over his shock. “Listen to me, ma’am. You’re going to leave this room. I am going to dress my brother. And then we are leaving your home.” His voice was trembling with the effort of containing his anger, and Tina looked from his wand to Newt, shaking on the bed, and slowly walked out. Theseus grabbed Newt’s shoulder to get him up, but the younger Scamander brother screamed and tried to pull away. “Move, come on. I know you’re scared, but we’re leaving now, alright? I’ll take you to a lovely hospital, they’ll help you there,” he said softly. 

It took almost an hour of cajoling, but Theseus eventually had Newt clothed. “Let’s go, then.” Newt shook his head, raising his thumb to his lips. His brother sighed. “Don’t make this complicated, please.” When Newt still refused to go with him, Theseus simply grabbed his arm and apparated out of the apartment. He brought them to an alley near the asylum, and, ignoring Newt’s panicking (apparition had always scared him), dragged his brother toward the large building.

It didn’t take long to turn him over to the asylum. The nurses allowed Theseus to walk Newt to his room, and the elder brother willfully ignored how crowded the place seemed. “You’ll be happy here,” he assured Newt as he gently pushed him onto a cot. “They’re going to fix you, and you’ll be normal. You’ll be so much better, I promise,” he continued. Previously, he had assumed he’d have to leave Newt in an asylum for the rest of his life, but Queenie’s information had made him wonder if maybe his brother could be made to talk and adopt acceptable behavior. He’d like nothing more than that.

Newt whimpered and grabbed Theseus’s arm. He hated unfamiliar places, he missed Tina, and he didn’t trust these impersonal nurses. But his brother just smiled and patted his head like he was a child, then turned to the nurses. They started saying a lot of things about Newt and the hospital, some of which sounded painful, and Theseus eventually left without a second glance. One of the nurses left with him, but returned a few minutes later with some sort of shot. The larger nurse grabbed Newt’s arms without warning and held him down while the smaller nurse pressed the needle into his neck, both of them ignoring his frightened yelps. He was unconscious in moments.


	8. Chapter 8

Theseus had told Newt, before he left, that the nice doctors would make him better. He said he’d be able to talk, control his bladder, function in crowds, make eye contact. “Do what they tell you,” he’d said gently. And Newt had tried. He’d listened to the nurses and followed them down the hall on his first day at the asylum. They brought him to a small, plain room with a chair in the middle. One of them gave him a cold smile and sat him in it. “Can you understand me?” After a moment, Newt nodded. “Good. Now, I want you to repeat after me; just say ‘hello’.” 

Newt stared at her blankly. He had tried to talk before, but all he could manage was meaningless noise. Tina had kissed him and said it didn’t matter, said he was perfect just the way he was, but Theseus and the nurses clearly didn’t agree. Newt shuffled nervously, tugging on the hospital gown they’d apparently dressed him in while he slept. “Mmm,” he hummed quietly. “No. Hello. Say it.” Newt whined softly and shook his head, touching his throat to convey that he wasn’t refusing to speak, he just couldn’t.

The nurse sighed. “Newton, I need you to stop being stubborn.” But I’m not, Newt protested internally. “Say hello now.” She held up a syringe full of some unknown liquid, and Newt flinched away. The other nurse grabbed his arms and strapped them to the arms of the chair with leather strips Newt hadn’t previously noticed, then did the same to his legs. “Hello,” the first nurse urged. Newt made a frantic yelping noise, beginning to cry as he shook his head.

“I hate doing this,” the nurse said sadly. She pressed the needle into his arm and stepped back, picking up a clipboard. Newt felt his limbs tingle painfully for a minute, then slowly fell unconscious, terrified he was going to die. The nurses watched him twitch for a moment, his eyes darting around fearfully. The convulsions got progressively worse until he was thrashing so violently it looked like he could break his spine. After half an hour, the seizure stopped, but Newt remained passed out for almost twenty minutes after. 

The nurses unstrapped him and carried him back to his room, carelessly lying him on the hard cot that passed as a bed. By the time he woke up, they were gone. Newt sat up slowly, wincing at the ache permeating his entire body. He saw that he’d wet himself- the nurses had sneered that they certainly weren’t going to change diapers on a grown man, adding that he’d only get one hospital gown. “If you soil yourself, that’s your problem.”

Hours passed, and Newt paced back and forth in the little room, feeling very much like a caged animal. He missed Tina, and irrationally hoped she would come take him away from here. Maybe the nurses wouldn’t try to make him talk tomorrow. Or maybe he could talk and just wasn’t trying hard enough. Newt spent the rest of the night trying to say “hello”, but eventually dissolved into tears and gave up.


	9. Chapter 9

Newt had nothing to write with in the asylum, so he compiled a mental list of unspoken rules.

One- talking was important, and he was supposed to do it. If he didn’t, they gave him a drug that made him thrash and hurt so much he passed out. The nurses took him to that room every day and tried to make him speak, but he couldn’t, and after a week he was sore all the time and his hands shook too much to hold onto anything.

Two- it was disgusting and immature to have accidents. The nurses wouldn’t clean him up if he did, and he couldn’t cry about the rash down his legs, because it was his fault.

Three- the patients all bathed at the same time, and they weren’t allowed to cover themselves. Male and female wards were separate, and Newt was grateful for that, but there was one patient who said he was pretty as a girl and watched him hungrily in the showers. Newt had tried to curl into a ball and ignore him, but the nurses forced him to his feet and held him under the freezing water, scrubbing him roughly and ignoring his struggling. So Newt learned that if he didn’t stand up on his own in the showers, he’d be made to, and somebody else would wash him.

Four- if he misbehaved, he wouldn’t be allowed to eat. And he misbehaved a lot, by not speaking and wetting himself and crying. Newt had always been slim, and it wasn’t long before his ribs stood out.

Five- the lights went out at 9:00 PM, and if he made too much noise after that or got out of bed, he’d be taken to the laundry room. One nurse would hold him down while another wrapped him in burning hot sheets just out of the wash, tied so tight around him that he couldn’t move, could hardly breathe, and left him there until the sheets cooled, hours later.


	10. Chapter 10

Theseus wasn’t the first person to disapprove of Tina’s relationship with Newt. Queenie hadn’t cared, had in fact thought they were sweet together, but their neighbor had not felt the same way. Mrs. Chandler was an older widow, and when she met Newt in the hall she seemed to like him. “He reminds me of my grandaughter. She’s not all there, the poor dear… what do they call it? Mental retardation? Well, she’s a sweetheart, you know, just like this dear boy.” All of this was said to Tina despite the fact that Newt was right there.

Despite her insensitivity, Mrs. Chandler was always kind to Newt, albeit in a fairly condescending manner. She occasionally offered him cookies and reached up to pat his head, commenting on how sweet the Goldstein sisters were to care for an invalid. Shortly after Tina and Newt began their romance, Tina made the mistake of kissing him in the hallway. She hadn’t thought anyone was there.

The next day, Mrs. Chandler approached her furiously. “What are you doing to him?” “Pardon?” “That retarded man, Newton. I saw you kissing him last night- how could you take advantage of a… of someone like that?” Tina had gaped at her. “It’s not like that at all,” she finally managed. “Newt isn’t simple, he’s only… he’s different.” Mrs. Chandler was not moved. “You ought to be ashamed,” she hissed.

Tina spent the rest of her day thinking over the old woman’s words. She wasn’t “taking advantage”, was she? Newt understood what they were doing, he was a consenting adult, he just needed more help in certain areas. While she was thinking it over in bed, Newt suddenly snuggled up to her and laid his head on her shoulder. She snapped out of her trance and stroked his hair- Newt hated being touched by anyone else, but he was usually affectionate with Tina. Later, she would look into his intelligent blue eyes and wonder how she’d ever doubted their love.

But in the end, Mrs. Chandler’s opinion had been irrelevant. Theseus’s very much was not. He had dragged his brother off to some asylum, left him there to die alone. The thought of it made Tina want to punch someone. There was nothing wrong with Newt, but he was locked up somewhere, being told he was broken and worthless. She had to find him and bring him home.


End file.
